Shakes All Over Like A Jelly Fish - The Six Month Plan

Updated October 2014
Do you love a to-do list bloggers? We do. How about reading other peoples to-do lists? Not so much? Well tough, we're about to list ours for the next 6 months.

Squirrel

Complete the last semester of the final year of a Health Science - Public Health degree!!  (Done, 28/10/14)

Get through placement (which is taking place in the State government...fancy!)  (Done 8/10/14)
Start applying for full time jobs.

Arrange the possibility of a second Pub Clinic, in Melbourne, to tie in with Movember. (Made the decision to not be involved! Too much others stuff on!)

Try very hard not to cry about how much is going on. I haven't cried in over two months, not even when I wrote my car off!

Remember her all time favorite inspirational quote "It always seems impossible until it's done" from the great man, Nelson Mandela. I don't usually go in for inspirational quotes; often they are by someone who I do not find inspirational (Marilyn Munro anyone?) or anyone who is famous simply for being attractive. I mean how strange is it that as a society we are expected to admire people on their attractiveness alone? Off topic: last week I read both a glossy men and womens magazine, both had lists of inspirational people for the year. The womens magazine listed a bunch of supermodels who were rich. The mens magazine had genuinely interesting people who do things other than being attractive, eg George Clooney. It's sad. Women are encouraged to believe that attractiveness is the be all and end all. I'd much rather be interesting and capable than pretty. But there you go. 

Puffin

Continue along the path of braces, another tooth removal, and implants. It would be really good if these could be finalised by the end of the year but at the end of the day, what really needs to happen is for things to be done right this time, so we don't have to have any work done again.

Maintain the veggie patches, which are coming along pretty well!

Squirrel&Puffin

Continue work on the front of the house and associated landscaping, as outlined in this blog post.This weekend just gone in fact, we sourced another quote for the stacked stone, and got a sample to have a look at next to our bricks. 

This will require the assistance of probably Badger and Mitchy, who will help us to bring the facade of our house into the new millennium.

Clean out the garage and hold a garage sale.

Make plans for 2015. We really want to travel back to the UK and Europe, but suspect that we might be heading in 2016. This is rather dependent on Squirrels job situation. 

And that's pretty much it, apart from the odd small project here and there. What's on your lists bloggers? 

I walked right out of the machinery

 You know what  I love? DEMIJOHNS! And/or Carboys! Which are the giant glass bottles I have been hankering after!

If you see one of these lying around, in sea-glass green (not green green) PLEASE BUY IT FOR ME! It's got to be like, the size of two big human heads. Really big. And round, as per above! And Meerkat got me one in Daylesford!! Looooooook!

Demijohn!!!!!

Anyway.

A couple of months ago I was driving with the Badger and Meerkat through Richmond after an Ikea trip and my eye was caught by the most beautiful geometric chest of drawers. Through the marvel that is the internet, I searched for the shop name, saw that they sold online, and found the unit...ta-da!

From The Family Love Tree, for the bargain price of ...$1995. Yep, ouch. I also do not need a chest of drawers. But soooo pretty! So, what is there to do but put our own twist on this, on a different piece of furniture? Our table and chairs, which have been partially renovated still need a bit of colour - at the moment its a wood table on wood floors and, well, you don't want too much wood. Just ask Tiger. So, I drew up some plans. On paint. This is what I ended up with.

Now I never said this was my strong suite. I'm good at doing, not at drawing up, when it comes to renovations. I mean, I can plan like a general, but designing by hand, nup. I'm out. The brown is the bits I'm leaving as wood.

So, the before!

The first step - removing the orange varnish. I began this with the orbital, but after getting only about 3 inches done (in 10 minutes!), it (temporarily) died on me! Then I used Badgers, since he was around for the day working on our doors - Thanks again Badger! - but this wasn't making a lot of head way either, and the belt sander was beckoning. After what seemed like 4 minutes later, the table was sanded! Thanks belt sander! 

Badger then took the rounded edges off with the circular saw - I forgot to take photos of this bit! But I love how much more modern the lines of the table are now! 

Then it was time for maths! I divided up the table with a pencil and ruler, and then set about numbering it...

...and the paint chips, like so. An epic version of paint by numbers! 

The first way I attempted this was by doing each colour individually. As I went to bed that night though, I started to worry that the three strips of triangles wouldn't match nicely if I continued in this way.

So the next day, I taped off the two long edges, and half of the triangles. I then rolled these on. Here was my second and third mistakes. Second - not pushing the tape down enough, leading to some bleeding. Third - switching to a nap roller instead of sponge. I used sponge on the first day and it went on beautifully but I had a bit of a brain fart and forgot how to wash it properly. After applying the yellow, green and a blue with a nap roller and seeing it was leaving a bit of build up, I remembered how to clean the foam one, and switched back. 

Note: it was about here that I locked myself out of the house, couldn't break in, and had to walk to the house of Badger and Mumma Bear to await Badgers homecoming to break in through the roof. Who's having a good run? This girl.

This was a photo of the mid way point - it looks awesome from here but a bit closer and you can see the bleed in the lines. To fix this, I hit it lightly with the mouse sander, then taped these colours off and re-hit them with the foam roller. This helped especially with the yellow, as it's coverage wasn't great after the first two coats. But that's yellow for you! The coverage of a crocheted bikini!!

I then got back into the swing of things by taping off the alternative triangles on the edges, and painting these.

With this being the result. You can see my furry helper here. The weather was good so on this day I was able to tape off the middle section and get another bit done.

I then re-did the teal areas, where the bleed from the thick nap had made a small mess, and re-did some of the yellow again. I also took the orbital to the edges to give us our clean lines. Next, Puffin carried the table into the weather-proof environment of the shed (did you guys know we had a shed? I forget we do half of the time!) and I rolled on a coat of acrylic gloss varnish. According to the internet, acrylic goes best over water based (for what are probably obvious reasons to those of you who play with paint) and for anyone who has had the misfortune of having to use anything oil based, it's also easier to clean etc but it ALSO will, apparently, not make the timber go that yellow-y colour. Huzzuh.

I added another gloss coat the day after and finally, it was time to come back inside - the final final product, in it's place!

Before & After! 

And that's it! I think that the triangles on the chairs AND the table make it look a bit busy, so down the track we might replace the chairs with some that match our bar stools, like these...

Maybe a mix of white and yellow chairs? We'll see. These are $59.00 each at Milan Direct. I might also swap the chair legs our at some point for some sexy chrome ones, if I see some that I like the look of. 

What do you think bloggers? This project took over two months but if you had a solid week off you could knock something similar out in no time. My challenge was our weekends away (Hepburn and Tassie) and working just about every other day unless I had something on! But lo and behold on the final day of university holidays, it is complete!

Another post is going straight up later tonight, so keep your eyes peeled for Squirrel and Puffin updates! 

Blouse & Slacks

Fear not bloggers, for we are working hard on our next renovation post! But what have we been up to? Working hard at our jobs, cleaning up the yard and getting plans ready for it as well, planning more mouth-stuff for Puffin, planning the return to uni for the final semester for Squirrel ... and going with the family of Squirrel down to Tassie to explore and visit our good friends Kit and Face! Here are some of the amazing places Tassie had to offer! 

Squirrel, Badger, Mumma Bear and Meerkat at Russell Falls! So coordinated. Much wow. 

Russell Falls, again.

Meerkat, Puffin and Squirrel at 'the Neck' lookout at Bruny island. Bruny island was spectacular and I would have LOVED to have explored it further. 

The surprisingly lovely Salmon Ponds, where you could enjoy crepes by the lake and feed the fish! This was way more fun than you would think. Also very picturesque! 

And lastly, Richmond Bridge. There were plenty more amazing places and things we did- the markets, the amazing antique store in Richmond, Tasmans Arch, the amazing seafood, cheese and fruit on offer, visiting the Cascade brewery, catching up with Kit and Face... it was an action packed and lovely four days in the Apple Isle!! 

We will be posting again in about a weeks time - the final section of my project will be done on Saturday/Sunday, and will be ready for photos on Tuesday-ish.